Commercial and non-commercial vehicles now include tire pressure monitoring systems (TPMS) which include a central module, integrated or in communication with an electronic control unit of the vehicle, and tire pressure monitoring sensors for each of the vehicle wheel units. In general, the TPMS sensors monitor tire pressure within a respective tire and transmits a wireless signal to the central module which is indicative of tire pressure. Should the sensed pressure be outside of an acceptable range or a substantial change in tire pressure occur, an alarm is generated and transmitted to the user of the vehicle.
Over time, TPMS sensors may require replacement by service technicians due to damage, depleted battery or otherwise. In today's TPMS market, particularly the aftermarket, certain manufacturers offer TPMS sensors that can be flash programmed by a service technician with suitable operating software for a particular make, model and year of a vehicle. Unfortunately, this requires the technician to accurately determine the make, model and year of the vehicle and also laboriously scroll through a programming tool, or device, to select the determined make, model and year of the vehicle. Should the technician incorrectly identify the vehicle or unintentionally select the wrong program software, one or more, or even all, of the sensors may be incorrectly programmed and rendered unusable. Once the technician realized their mistake, they must again scroll through the programming tool to select the correct vehicle make, model and year, and once again program all of the sensors. Whether the technician accurately identifies the vehicle, or not, time is wasted through this laborious process.